Retention Revisited!

In the first bit about retention of athletes the subject was keeping new young athletes in the club and in the sport. This time I want to talk about the importance of keeping our best athletes in the face of competition from other clubs. In 1985 we entered the Scottish League for the first time and for the first couple of years or so we had to requalify for the League which had three divisions. By 1995 we were ranked in the top six clubs in Scotland and were either at the top of Division Two or the bottom of Division One of a five division league (8 teams per division). How did we get there? The first thing we did was to set out a clear vision of where we wanted to go so that the athletes knew what was planned. The second thing we did was organise the coaching to cover every area that we would need to cover. The athletes helped organise the teams.

We were helped by the fact that several top class athletes did not leave the club despite approaches from other clubs. For instance Lachie Carter was a 50+ metre hammer thrower and a 13 metre shot putter on a regular basis, Craig McDaid was a 6 metre + long jumper and a first rate 400 metre runner who both stayed with us. In fact Lachie even told us when he was approached by another club and Phil Dolan and I took it all the way to the SAAA Rules and Regulations Committee. If you have athletes who are (a) very talented and (b) good role models then they attract others to them. Do we have any Lachie Carters/Craig McDaids in the club just now? I would suggest for a start that we have Johnathan Farrell, Ryan Savage and Peter Bowman who could easily become such star players. One of the best would be Paul Doherty if he gets fit and can start competing again. So we have the framework. Second, do we have a clear vision where we want to go? A club wandering aimlessly along is not very attractive; just as passengers need to know the bus's destination so athletes need to have a clear goal. Well, Phil, Donald and I all know what we are trying to achieve and I think if there is something that could be put right here it is in communicating with the athletes. There was also a desire among all the athletes to turn out for the club.

There are also tangible signs of support and good will from the club committee - they pay the not inconsiderable subs for the SYAL and the Scottish League and they have also agreed to make a sizeable contribution to the squad that Phil is taking to Gothenburg for a week in June. We have the targets, we have the athletes and the coaches to go a fair way along the road. We need more athletes because the turnover is great, we need the good ones to stay with us to attract others, we need athletes (including distance runners tempted by the Auchenshuggle 10K) to want to compete for the club and we also need officials as part of the team. Given those we will be back where we should be. If anyone wants a copy of the club ranking lists done by John Lunn in Sheffield, they are available from me.